Retail Pharmacist
Dispenses prescribed pharmaceuticals to the public, educates customers on health promotion, disease prevention and the proper use of medicines, and sells non-prescription medicines and related goods in a community pharmacy. Registration or licensing is required.
ANZSCO 2013, the edition the department applies to the points tested visas (189, 190 and 491).
Job titles this occupation covers
If your job title is one of these, this is usually the code it belongs to, whatever your employer calls the role.
- Community Pharmacist
Duties
Published for unit group 2515 Pharmacists
- receiving prescriptions, checking patients' medicine histories, and ensuring optimal dosage and methods of administration and drug compatibility before dispensing
- preparing or supervising the preparation and labelling of liquid medicines, ointments, powders, tablets and other medications to fill prescriptions
- advising prescribers on drug incompatibility and contra-indications
- reviewing and monitoring the medicine therapy of individual patients, and assessing the effectiveness of the total medicine therapy
- maintaining prescription files and recording issue of narcotics, poisons and habit-forming drugs
- storing and preserving vaccines, serums and other drugs subject to deterioration
- supplying non-prescription medicines, and diagnostic and therapeutic aids
- supervising and coordinating the work of Pharmacy Technicians, pharmacy interns and Pharmacy Sales Assistants
- conducting research to develop and improve pharmaceuticals, cosmetics and related chemical products
- conferring with Chemists, Engineering Professionals and other professionals about manufacturing techniques and ingredients
- testing and analysing drugs to determine their identity, purity and strength in relation to specified standards
- developing standards for drugs used in pharmaceuticals
This is what the occupation is, not what a skills assessment requires. The assessing body applies its own criteria on top of this, and those criteria are not published here. Check them with the body itself.
Who assesses this occupation
Last confirmed against the department's list on 30 July 2026.
Where Retail Pharmacist stands right now
Vizard tracks the live queue for this occupation: how many people are waiting at every points score for the 190, 491, the recent invitation round cutoffs, and how far down the queue your own score puts you. 4 state nomination lists include this occupation.
Updated to 1 July 2026, from the department's own SkillSelect data.
See where you standWhere this comes from
Definition and duties: Australian Bureau of Statistics, ANZSCO
Assessing authorities and skilled lists: Department of Home Affairs skilled occupation list
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